We’ve signed to go to France,
And we hope we get a chance,
For we’ve all come out for duty and for fun;
We’re the Hunts Battalion boys,
And we’re all our mothers’ joys,
But we’re also sons of Britain—every one.
Isaac whispered “Except me, who’s Russian.” Then he added “And you and me not having mothers. Not that we weren’t a joy to them once, no doubt.”
But I could see that he looked excited as well as entertained by all the carrying-on.
Cheer Ho! Cheer Ho!
Do we dream this thing? Oh, no!
We have waked from simple slumbers by the gun,
And the thing that we’re about
Is to wipe the “Germ–Hun” out
Or to die like British Soldiers—every one.
I’d never thought the last verse was the best. Even we recruits knew that if you slumbered by your gun, you’d be up on charges; and it was noticeable that those who were being sent off to Scarborough to cycle around, looking for spies at railway stations, were the most enthusiastic about dying like British soldiers every one.
1916
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
Benedict, France,
1915–1916
BENEDICT HAD TAKEN A COMMISSION in the Royal Field Artillery and continued with the plan Theo had once laid out for them both. The winter of 1914 was spent in the mud on Salisbury Plain or in the schoolroom, being taught math. Theo had gone from Brooklands, where he’d learned to fly, straight to training at Hendon.
Theo was sent out to Ypres almost as soon as he had finished training, while Benedict had a home posting in a garrison manning the southern defenses. The two short letters Benedict received from Flanders were of tales of derring-do that were hard to reconcile with the photographs of devastation that appeared weekly in the newspapers, or with the early casualty figures—or, at least, hard if you didn’t know Theo.
Each of Theo’s letters ended with a few musical notes instead of a signature. The first one had puzzled him until he realized it was the opening bar of “The Battle Hymn of the Republic.” The second was in response to his reply, telling Theo he was finally being posted overseas—to France. These notes were more recognizable, not least because the bar end was a tiny soldier. It was Gilbert’s “The Soldiers of Our Queen.” Theo scrawled across the bottom, “I’m to France as well. Shall we meet?” And then he quoted from the song: “Upon the battle scene they fight the foe together.”
It seemed unlikely. When he’d gone home and told Lettie that Theo was now a pilot, she had looked puzzled.
“Weren’t you and Theo going to join together? In the same regiment?”
He’d come close to lying, to providing a reason that wasn’t about Theo’s inability to think except in the moment. A promise, made by Theo, was not a binding commitment, more a measure of his current mood.
The next letter began with with a small angel with a cockade, blowing a trumpet with fat cheeks: Bb. Bb. Bb. Eb. Eb—“La Marseillaise.”
I know where you are, you secretive, virtuously discreet son of a gun, and I’m billeted near you chaps. Based at Doullens. Kept meaning to write again but you know how it is. Flying all hours. There’s a sort of joy in it that’s like playing Bach when Brewer’s away. A good machine, a good plan of operation, and then skill and luck. Found this bijou residence—Harmony Cottage we call it. But the two chaps I was sharing with have left. One’s back at H.Q. with promotion and a staff officer’s job, the other’s got chicken pox. Now we are one—or however the rhyme goes. I was dreading some starchy fellow being foisted on me. How do you fancy moving in? Might not be for long, but we could shift your stuff stat. It’s practically a palace. Well, actually it’s a one-roomed hovel, but we live in great style. We’ve got a well. Cabbages, more or less. We’ve even got a bedstead: what they call a “matrimoniale.” Took it in turns. But you and I could share, being old friends. I’ll fumigate it. You won’t catch the dreaded pox. And I can show you my masterwork. Seriously. It’s a cantata. Or will be. On aeroplanes, on flight.
A moment with your guard down and happiness could catch you just as unexpectedly as a sniper’s bullet, Benedict thought, and was full of fear.
Yet he had settled into a billet with Theo at the cold, single-story farmhouse; and with a third man, a pilot called Dougie who also stayed from time to time, they made a strangely happy household. One of them had a hammock, one took the iron bed, and one slept on a horsehair mattress laid on empty ammunition boxes. Dougie had insisted on planting seeds he’d brought from home and promised a garden next spring. To Benedict’s surprise, Theo really was writing a cantata, although there was nothing religious about it. Read on the page, it was strange and brilliant, sometimes lyrical, sometimes almost violent. Could it be played? He wasn’t sure. When he had any hours free, Theo would sit and work at it, the oil lamp catching him in its halo of light, tapping out the rhythm with a pencil held in mittened hands. If Dougie wasn’t there to observe him, Benedict could lie, half sleeping in the hammock, watching him with wonder. Theo. Theo. Theo.